Here’s the good news: I now have several egg cartons, tin cans, and plastic trays full of sprouting herbs and vegetables. Whoo-hoo!
The bad news? All this indoor planting has created a fruit fly population explosion at my house.
The little buggers have hatched in the soil I guess. I used Miracle Grow, and have no idea how they got in there. But, they did. Now, they’re all over my dining room, where my little sprouties are trying to grow.

Well, there they are, in all their delicate beauty: my first sprouts.
What are they?
I’m sad to say I’m not sure. I know they’re herbs of some kind, but I used egg crates and didn’t have a good way to label them (and then I forgot what I planted!).

Well, it’s been almost two weeks since I got my vermicompost bin set up! If you missed the original post, Adventures in Vermicomposting, where I described setting up my vermicompost bin for the first time, you can see it here.
I took some pictures today to show you all how my worms (who I’ve named The Snickersons) are coming along.
I decided to put my vermicompost bin in my dining room. But, it actually works really well in there, as you can see!

My life has been feeling pretty hectic lately. It feels as if I’ve got too many balls in the air,  that I’m too plugged in, too “in motion” all the time. It feels as if I’ve just been skimming on the surface of things, going too quick to really absorb and reflect on the thoughts and information I’m processing all the time.
I’m sure you’ve had that feeling before. In fact, I’d be willing to bet that most of you feel like this a good deal of the time. Rushed. Overstimulated. Out of control. Stretched too thin.
It’s not good!

Well, I finally did it! After all this time, I finally got my vermicompost system up and running. My goal was to start vermicomposting last summer. June in fact. Well, 7 months down the road is better late than never!
The reason I didn’t start vermicomposting earlier is because a) we were travelling a lot and b) our house was (and still is) on the market. I thought potential buyers wouldn’t want to see a vermicompost bin in the kitchen, so I held off.

Oh, I love giveaways so much! And, I have a great contest to tell all of you about this week.
Hometown Seeds is offering all of you a chance to win some of their awesome seeds for gardening this spring! The contest runs today, February 9, through next Tuesday, February 16.
On Wednesday, February 17, I will pick several winners.
What can you win?
Seeds for this year’s garden!

You know how it is when a white mug gets stained with coffee and tea? Well, some of my white mugs are starting to look decidedly brown, and no amount of scrubbing can set them right. So, I was surfing online this afternoon looking for a thrifty way to get the stains out.
I happened upon this great post, which suggested that scrubbing the mug with baking soda would do the trick.
Eureka!

Photo courtesy Picturejockey, FlickrCC

When most people think of vodka, they think “martini”, not “wonder household cleaning and disinfecting product”.
But, I was shocked to learn the other day that, in addition to spicing up your Bloody Mary, vodka has tons of uses around the house as a natural home remedy. Who knew?
Here are 10 things you can use your vodka for around the house:
Vodka Use #1: Poison Ivy Killer
I could have really used this one a few weeks ago.

Cathy's Shipping Container Home Plan

If you’ve spent any amount of time here at The Greenest Dollar then you know I’m close friends with Renaissance Ronin, a fellow blogger and shipping container home builder. Ronin’s heart is about as big as they come, and he’s currently helping build a shipping container home for a wife of a soldier killed in Iraq. And this woman, Cathy, really needs our help.

Thanks to the Great Recession, as everyone seems to be calling it now, most of us cut back on our spending during 2009.
Business was down for many (my own business was down over 30% from last year…ouch!), unemployment rampant, and those who did manage to keep their jobs were often gripped by fear that they might lose theirs. And, we’re not out of the woods yet.
Yes, it was a bummer.